Pusarla Venkata Sindhu, who had entered the Hong Kong Superseries badminton championships specifically to protect her World No 2 ranking, remained the sole Indian to enter the quarter-finals of the $400,000 prize money tournament, as compatriots Saina Nehwal and HS Prannoy were shown the door in second-round on Thursday.
Sindhu gave a substantially improved performance over her tepid display in the China Open Superseries Premier last week, to notch a convincing 21-14, 21-17 victory in 39 minutes against former Asian junior champion Aya Ohori, and take her career head-to-head record against the Japanese 21-year-old to 3-0.
File photo of PV Sindhu. AFP.File photo of PV Sindhu. AFP.
Breaking away from five-all in the opening game, the lanky Indian smashed her way to 9-5, and never relinquished her lead. It was almost an identical story in the second stanza, where an initial 5-1 lead sufficed for her to seal the deal.
Basically, it was the confidence of having beaten Ohori twice before that enabled the second seed to book a quarter-final slot against Japan’s Akane Yamaguchi, whom she will be meeting for the second time this season. Sindhu suffered a humiliating 14-21, 9-21 loss to the Japanese in the French Open last month, though she still leads their head-to-heads 3-2.
However, Sindhu’s conqueror in the recent Indian National final, Nehwal, frittered away a decent start to steadily lose steam against the speedy and fit No 8 seed, Chen Yufei of China, and ended up on the wrong side of an 18-21, 21-19, 21-10 verdict, in what was the first meeting between the two players.
Friday’s quarter-final line-up is as follows (prefix denotes seeding; Q indicates qualifier; PFQ indicates promoted from qualifying):
Men’s singles:
PFQ-Kazumasa Sakai (Japan) vs Anders Antonsen (Denmark),
Q-Lee Dong Keun (South Korea) vs 5-Chen Long (China),
6-Shi Yuqi (China) vs 3-Lin Dan (China),
8-Lee Chong Wei (Malaysia) vs 2-Son Wan Ho (South Korea).
Women’s singles:
1-Tai Tzu Ying (Chinese Taipei) vs 8-Chen Yufei (China),
3-Sung Ji Hyun (South Korea) vs 7-He Bingjiao (China),
6-Ratchanok Intanon (Thailand) vs Michelle Li (Canada),
5-Akane Yamaguchi (Japan) vs 2-Pusarla V Sindhu (India).
